Review - How to Talk to Teenagers About Sex

The topic of sex is often not an easy one to get into especially when you’re a parent and have teenage kids. Then there is the topic of the internet and social media. We have heard many a time how much the influence of the internet has affected young lives and the dangers it brings. Us adults ourselves have yet to figure out how we would navigate around these tough subjects, especially where sex and relationships are concerned. So, how do we get the dialogue going when it comes to talking about it with our own children? To help answer this question and more, I watched this discussion in which Jeremy Indika, the founder of Something to Say interviews Dr. Emily Setty, who is a lecturer in Criminology at the University of Surrey, where they discuss the topic of ‘How to Talk to Teenagers About Sex’.

The discussion is particularly interesting as it begins with an emphasis on the lack of knowledge around the laws of sharing children’s images online, and this too, especially among teenagers. The discussion also brings to light the intricacies related to sex and relationships among teenagers, the challenges and problems they face and how best to deal with them. These conversations need to take place more often. Listening to experts on these subjects and to people who can relate to these situations especially when they have gone through difficult experiences, have a unique perspective to offer. It gives us an opportunity to learn from their experiences, their research and work and to help us get our doubts and issues cleared. Again, with the topic of how to communicate to our children about sex and online activity and how to be safe out there, isn’t easy as we might think.

We can’t instil fear into our teenagers or prevent them from looking at a phone or interacting with people altogether in the hopes of keeping them safe. This isn’t how society works. Both, parents and teenagers could benefit a lot from becoming involved with these discussions where parents can understand how to approach and put across this tricky subject to their children as well as give teenagers an understanding of why their parent/s would feel or respond the way they do and demonstrate their need to ask questions and learn about how to navigate through these entities, who to consult if they are ever faced with a certain situation etc. Teenagers in this day and age are no longer passive listeners. Today’s youth are smart and open and all they require from us adults, is for us to be open and clear with them, even if we might not have all the answers in tow.

With the digital landscape having overtaken our everyday lives and with almost every one of us out there being reliant on a smartphone device for our correspondences, it makes it easier for youth especially, to access sexual material online at the touch of a button. Regulating these actions has become challenging unless we ban everything altogether and that’s not something that will ever happen to the extent we want; it’s a part of our culture today. Teenagers are accustomed to the internet-of-things and it is a norm for them when compared to how we grew up.

It was also particularly interesting to hear about the laws behind the sharing of children’s images online. I realised that a majority of us aren’t fully aware of these laws. With regards to sharing indecent images online of an under-18 child, it is illegal and punishable by law. As Dr. Setty puts it, we tend to ‘order’ teenagers not to do something, but they would try and find a way around it somehow. In this way, we, as adults, only end up pushing the issue further underground. There is a lack of knowledge around the topic of why it is illegal to share images online of children, especially among teenagers. So, continuing to build a narrative and simply, talking to them openly, is guaranteed to bring about valuable change.

Teenagers simply need to be out there in the world and learn how to face it all, as difficult as it may be. At the same time, normalising the topic of sex and opening more space for these discussions to take place enables youth to become more sensitised to the topic. When these issues are brought out to the open, it becomes easier to learn from each other whilst also honing each other’s listening skills at the same time. Encouraging these kinds of activities in schools is no doubt important. Youth prefer to talk and discuss things rather than have things lectured at them.

Dr. Setty also talks about the problem with the juxtaposition where relationships and sex education (RSE) is concerned. She says, “We teach them about safe sex, what to use in terms of contraceptives etc. but then when it comes to the digital realm, we suddenly tell them not to do it. Sex and relationships can be this safe thing but then if it’s online, it’s a firm ‘don’t do it’. So, for a young person, that distinction doesn’t mean anything.”

Though I’m not a parent myself, I’ve always wondered how it would be like when I will have a child of my own one day and when the time comes for that discussion about the birds and the bees and then moving further, sexual behaviour online. It feels like discussions like this would always come about as helpful as there is knowledge being imparted, questions thrown back and forth and research conducted regularly especially within youth groups where every instance and every answer is unique than it was yesterday. Each experience a teenager faces would be unique and it is important that we keep our minds open to their issues and simply, being there for them when they need us.

Dr. Setty also talks about peer pressure and performativity among teens that tends to mask a lot of complex outlooks, especially amongst boys. In her research process, she talks to teenage boys who are more than eager to come out of their shells and talk about these topics – this masculine bravado comes out but also their complexities and she’s able to pinpoint and learn more about their approaches and feelings. I would like to hear myself what these discussions would be like and perhaps if focus group discussions between teens and parents have been done before or whether she has an idea of doing anything like that in the near future. In a way, it might come about as therapeutic, I’d imagine.

There were other segments about the porn industry that I wasn’t aware of, that I learned about from this discussion, such as how boys get targeted with specific content via links that they receive, and how not knowing what the opposite sex thinks or feels about sex in comparison to how it is portrayed in pornography. There definitely is a lack of awareness and critical understanding of how the porn industry operates. It could be that the discussion around porn is incorrect. Dr. Setty puts forth a number of strategies of how to approach this kind of conversation between parents and teens and I’m sure there is a lot that we can take from this interview, which I found was eye-opening and educational.

If you are a parent of a teen, I believe that giving this discussion a listen would no doubt help you in deciding how to take that next step forward when it comes to analysing your approach with discussing about sex with your teenage child. And even if you are not a parent, you would have the understanding to at least share what you learn with another friend or parent and get the dialogue going. It is much-needed today that we keep these conversations alive and flowing. The more we talk about it, the more it will help us gain more perspectives, knowledge, and ways to comfortably communicate these topics with our children.?

To check out the YouTube video, visit this link - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KdLhdT1Cgv0